MEDIA WATCH: Corporate news and editorials utilize divisions in CTU to push further divides as House of Delegates decision approaches... Corporate media praise Claypool's lawsuit against Byrd Bennett, but ignore need for litigation on toxic swaps...

George N. Schmidt - March 22, 2016

Whether the members of the Chicago Teachers Union decide, through their delegates, to do a one day so-called "strike" on April 1, 2016, will not be known until after the March 23, 2016 CTU House of Delegates meeting. But discussions in the schools and elsewhere, including on social media, indicate that everyone is having a serious discussion of what all this means. At the March 21 CTU "Tele Town Hall," it was clear that decisions are still being made, and that the issue isn't "messaging," as some have tried to say, but the message itself.

By March 22, the Chicago Tribune ran another editorial against the proposed CTU "day of action", scheduled for April 1, 2016.

The latest of Mayor Rahm Emanuel's school leaders include, left to right, Father Michael Baranzini, CEO Forrest Claypool, and General Counsel Robert Marmer. All are seen during the February 24, 2016 Board of Education meeting. All of them became leaders of the nation's third largest school system after May 2016. Baranzini and Claypool were appointed by Emanuel under his powers under mayoral control. Marmer was appointed by Claypool and and approved by the Board, despite the fact that he had no previous knowledge or experience in school lay. Substance photo by George N. Schmidt. Ignored by most pundits is the fact that Chicago's mayor and his most recent schools "Chief Executive Officer" is the fact that massive incompetence at the top of the administration of the city's public schools is mainly to blame for the current problems. Not only has there been no comment editorially about the fact that Forrest Claypool is the fourth CEO at CPS since Emanuel's May 2011 inauguration, but an examination going back to the days when the system was run by Mayor Richard M. Daley has been weak. Those who talk about the schools have observed that Claypool has sued one of his predecessors, Barbara Byrd Bennett, for more than $60 million, supposedly because of Byrd Bennett's crimes.

But Claypool has not been asked by the mayor to sue the banks that forced that have been collecting excess fees and penalties from the so-called "toxic swaps" that were entered into during the years of the leadership of Arne Duncan.

And unreported despite the fact that corporate Chicago had reporters at Board of Education meetings during the past four years is the fact that CTU representatives and others (including this reporter) have repeatedly reminded the Board members, both during the years the Board was Richard M. Daley's and since, that the Board could and should demand restitution because the Board was misled on the toxic swaps. But despite dozens of appeals, each Board ignored the demands and suggestions.

The protests began even before Karen Lewis and her team became the leaders of the Chicago Teachers Union in July 2010. research showing that the Board had entered into variable rate bond deals during the early 2000s.

Although revenues are not the only issue facing CPS finances in 2016, despite discussions among some factions in the teachers union, the expenses of the school district have long been ignored by those with much power and some influence.

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